Advertisement
Published: March 3rd 2008
Edit Blog Post
We had a great day poolside at Bakabung. Wow, that African sun is no joke. Then we went for our first drive alone in Pilanesberg National Park. It was interesting to say the least. Dan was navigator and Dave drove. We headed towards where we were told there were elephants, and on the way spotted two giraffes up close. Wow! That’s definitely as close as I’ve ever been to an animal that large. They’re so tall! (how cliché, right? But man is it true!). We also saw impala and a stray wildebeest or two along the way. Then we got way close to a rhino. We opened the door to the van to see it better and it was maybe 10 feet away. OK now THIS is the closest I’ve ever been to an animal that large. And the rhino is way larger than the giraffe! Onward always keeping in mind that we have to be out of the park by 6:30pm, and we got super-close to 2 zebras. A third wasn’t far behind, but the two were again, RIGHT THERE. This animal interaction is just insane. Not bad sightings for our first attempt in the bush with no guide!
Dan
(with some helpers) cooked up another of his fabulous feasts for dinner - steak with blue cheese and mushroom/onion toppings, a salad, and corn cooked on the grill. I even ate some steak again and have to say, it was really good! I know, this new meat-eating Amanda is strange, but if I like it, I figure, why not? And how can you say no when there’s such a wonderful blue cheese/onion/mushroom combo involved? Groot Constantia was the wine of choice last night - a South African cabernet that’s delicious.
We were all up at 4:30 to go on a private game drive with a guide today. Rensha was our driver, and she was fantastic! A hot air balloon group had sighted a pride of lions from above, so off we went straight there. We saw a jackal on the way (huge ears!). Dave said “Now that’s like an impala in headlights…don’t you dare say deer!” [Pat was getting very frustrated with us yesterday for saying “Look, deer!” because there aren’t deer in Africa - only antelopes and the like. Very funny, Dave. Perhaps you had to be here. And mind you, it is pre-sunrise right now, so it is
just getting light. I looked ahead and said “Hmmm there’s something on the road up there.” And indeed there was - the pride of lions!! Two males and three females. Rensha pointed out that they’ve already had their kill this morning - you could tell because their bellies were large and they were lazing about. We were the first car to arrive, and although we were very quiet, the male that wasn’t partially hidden in the grass pretty quickly decided that the group should move on. So they walked on into that tall African bush grass right as two more vehicles drove up. Bummer for them! We got the goods on that one!!
We drove onward, up a bumpy, less traveled road. Got to see the gorgeous African sunrise over the bush - a beautiful pink/orangy sun. Next we saw a tsessebe (in the antelope family) - a lone territorial male. There seem to be a lot of lone territorial males out there of all varieties! Then, we all spotted a lone wildebeest (another territorial male!). He was acting sort of funny, and suddenly there on the road were three adult lions and four baby cubs! Jackpot! It was an
amazing half hour or so. We thought for a minute we might see a kill, but that wildebeest figured things out and took off the other way finally. First one of the males took the cubs into the grass away from us, the female followed, and the other male slowly walked up directly towards our vehicle. He came CLOSE. Oh my god we were all just in awe of this beautiful cat. Adam breaks out with “I can’t believe I’m taking a photo of the animal who’s about to eat me,” cracking us all up. But that lion didn’t seem all that far off from doing just that. He sidled right up next to the car, and luckily for us, cruised on by. When he was really close, nobody spoke. Nobody hardly breathed. I know I keep saying this, but each close encounter like that has been absolutely amazing, one right after another. This makes up for the non-shark day ten-fold! This male went by, and we could barely see the others in the grass. Rensha knew just what to do - she turned the vehicle around, and we slowly followed him. Success again! The other six lions came back
out of the grass onto the road, and we slowly followed them again for awhile. It was incredible seeing this family of seven wandering on. Every now and then, a cub or an adult or both would turn around and stare at us for awhile, just checking out what we were doing. So amazing!
Off again feeling very satisfied. We stopped at a blind and watched some hippos play and some friendly turtles. Saw two more rhino - mom and baby. Mom was a bit roughed up with a bloody spot near her eye. Rensha said it must have been something fierce to pierce her thick skin like that, but that it would heal quickly. Again, we were so close! They crossed the road right in front of us and moved over to the other side. Just very cool to see how they walk and move. They are absolutely enormous. Then a group of male impalas on the right side of the road, and down another minute, a group of female impalas on the left. Jokes a-plenty were made about a junior high dance, etc. Suddenly two rambunctious wart hogs running around. Now back towards the lodge, and got to
speaking of birds
this little guy never left the rhino's side see another hippo and our little baboon troop still on the dam. And then home. All this activity before 9am! Have now seen two of The Big Five, and counting. RSL continues…
And I have to add in our excitement over breakfast when we returned. Dan’s firing up eggs and sausages on the grill outside. I’m sitting on the couch, Adam’s sleeping on the other couch, and Dave and Cathy are back in the rooms. Dan heads in to do something, and I hear Dave yelling “monkey in the house!” I whip around to see the little sucker right behind me under the table. I jump up to shoo him out, and luckily he went. But there were about five more right outside working their way to the grill, one on the table who knocked over a glass of juice and broke it, and 2-3 more on the peripheral of our patio. Another is working on the bars right above Adam on the couch, trying to find a way in. I run out trying to shoo them away. They just didn’t give a damn about me. It was sort of hilarious. I would stomp and move towards them, and they
would dart/bob/weave towards me. I thought they might fly through the air and land on me, so I didn’t enjoy that. Dave had no shoes on so couldn’t hit the glassy pavement. Suddenly Dan comes out and does a much better job of getting them away. Pat had told us that the monkeys/baboons in general don’t really care about women, and only respond to men. Chauvinistic monkeys! Who would have thought? Anyway we definitely felt under attack all the way through breakfast working to fend them off. It was hilarious!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.128s; Tpl: 0.017s; cc: 6; qc: 24; dbt: 0.0806s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Ken Patton
non-member comment
Hello
Great pictures. Glad you are enjoying the safari. It is really amazing to be so close to the animals. Ken